LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — At the request of the county superintendent of schools, the Board of Supervisors has approved consolidating a special Middletown Unified School District Board election with the state primary in June.
Superintendent of Schools Brock Falkenberg asked the board to approve having the Registrar of Voters Office handle the election and consolidate it with the statewide primary on June 7.
Falkenberg submitted to the board a resolution of the Lake County Office of Education ordering the special election and seeking the consolidation with the primary.
The supervisors unanimously approved the request on Tuesday as part of its consent agenda.
The special election was triggered after a group of community members filed a petition to challenge the Dec. 1 appointment of Annette Lee to the Middletown Unified board.
Lee was chosen to fill the seat vacated a month and a half earlier by LaTrease Walker, who quit over her objections to COVID-19-related mandates.
Walker has since helped organize the petition against Lee, which was submitted to Falkenberg’s office on Dec. 30, just under the 30-day deadline after Lee’s appointment.
The petition’s proponents needed to collect 92 valid signatures, or 1.5% of the number of voters registered in the district’s last election, which totaled 6,129.
Falkenberg said his office received 185 signatures, of which 125 were deemed valid.
He said they also received one request to have a name removed from the petition.
Consolidating the election is meant to help cut the costs to Middletown Unified.
Registrar of Voters Maria Valadez told Lake County News she had estimated a stand-alone election could be as high as $50,000, based on a similar election held by another school district.
On Tuesday, she said that as long as no other school district asks to be consolidated, the cost could be about a third or half that $50,000 estimate.
Districts have until 88 days before the election — which this year is March 11 — if they want to place a measure on the ballot, and Valadez said she has had no indications so far that will happen.
She also cautioned, “The cost of everything has gone up.”
The Middletown Unified seat that will be on the ballot for the special election will also be on the ballot in November, as the term expires at the end of this year.
Some candidates for local offices are now circulating in-lieu petitions to reduce the costs of fees to file to run.
Valadez said school board candidates don’t do those in-lieu petitions, so candidate filings have not yet begun.
She said the filing period for the Middletown Unified seat will run from Feb. 14 to March 11.
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Middletown Unified School Board special election approved for state primary consolidation
- Elizabeth Larson
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